Bruce Lee- Love this poem plus the picture

True mastery transcends any particular art

It transcends from mastery of oneself

The ability developed through self discipline

To be calm, fully aware and completely in tune with oneself

Then amd only then can a person know himself.

Bruce Lee The Dragon

24.44 Personal Best

I knew I was going to run a personal best on my 3 mile run tonight. I beat my best time by 12 seconds completing the run in 24.44. Average pace of 8.15. I was a little disappointed as I pushed it as much as I could and only shaved 12 seconds off my time, however, I had done a fairly tough run on Tuesday and my legs had not fully recovered. The first part of my route is up hill and in future I will do a small warm up run so that I am fired up before I start. I have a 10k run next Tuesday and hoping to beat my previous time. I really want to get my time down below 24mins pace 8.0

Mind Rules for Running and Life

The following rules of the mind have helped me understand how my mind works and up my mental game. It is all pretty basic stuff but a good reminder not only for running but also for life.

1. Every thought or idea causes a physical action.-Fight of flight response- releases adrenaline.
2. What is expected tends to be realised- If you think positively it is more likely it will happen.
3. Imagination is more powerful than knowledge when dealing with your own mind- Believe and visualise achieving your goal.
4. Opposing ideas cannot beheld at the same time. I am going to finish my run or I will crash and burn,  your mind can only hold one idea otherwise it will be in conflict. Think I am going to do this.
5. Once an idea has been accepted by the subconscious mind it remains until it is replaced by another idea.When you learn something new it replaces existing behaviour. I am going to achieve a good time in my run is a much more powerful thought than I am trying to achieve a good time.
6. An emotionally induced symptom tends to cause organic change if persisted in long enough.The highs of completing a challenge  make you want to achieve more.
7. Each suggestion acted on creates less opposition to successive suggestions. Just do it move out of your comfort zone.
8. When dealing with the sub conscious mind and its function, the greater the conscious effort the less the subconscious response-Work to develop positive mental expectancy.

Training run 1st Feb

I meet a really good friend of mine at 17.00 on Tuesday evening for a catch up (more on this later) and only just got home in time to get changed and out for the Tuesday night run. This meant that I had not anything to eat since lunchtime apart from a Mars bar on the train on the way home.

There were 5 of us in the group tonight and we ran 10.4 miles at 9 minutes a mile pace, pretty much without stopping, which was exactly what we intended to do. This was another quality run and followed on from my. I have ran 25 good quality miles in 4 days ( 3 mile fast run on Sat, 11.4 hilly run on Sun) and I am very pleased with my recovery. I got very hungry towards the end of my run and this really was the lack of fuel before hand, just goes to show how important it is to be properly fuelled also ran in my second pair of trainers (asics) and got a blister on my foot. I used a small 100cm bootle for fluid half way but this really is a bit small so will have to sort something out.

Summary another good training run but now I need to start increasing the distance and I need to have my fuel and fluids sorted.

Age Graded % Calculation

I stumbled across an age graded % calculator on the goodrun guide website.

http://www.goodrunguide.co.uk/AgeGrading.asp

I am not sure how accurate it is but I found it very interesting.

80% is a National Class Runner
70% is a Regional Class Runner
60% is a Local Class Runner

To put this in context for me:

10k 70% 44mins   60% 50mins
1/2 Marathon 70% 1 hr 40  60% 1 hr 55
Marathon  70% 3 hr 25  60% 4 hr

This puts me in the category of Local Class Runner aiming for Regional Class Runner.

Water- Some additional advice- following on from previous post

One of the things I must do, is make sure that I properly hydrate myself during the day before my run. Drink enough fluid so that my body is nicely hydrated before each run. It is, however, very important to make sure that I stop drinking a couple of hours before the run so that I do not have to stop for a comfort break during the run.

Water

I can happily run 6-10 miles without taking on board any fluids but now I am about to start the longer training runs I need to start thinking about hydration.

• I have a hand held bottle but I find this very frustrating as it is a distraction and a think tenses my arm. 
• I have a camelbak belt which holds a bottle, which is fine when running but not very easy to use and I do not need such a big bottle of fluid.

I do not know how much fluid I need to take on board during a run, but when I was helping at London Marathon I was talking to a Doctor with the first aid team at the finish and she said that the most common problems they had to deal with were dehydration and hyponateremia. I can understand the dehydration but the hyponateremia (which is too much fluid-water poisoning) surprised me. The Doctors did explain the reason, which I cannot remember, but the key thing was it did not actually take too much extra water to cause the hyponateremia.

So what am I going to do?

I am going to listen to my body (Tai Chi basics)  and use a couple of small 100ml bottles which I can put into my jacket pockets, filled with Orange Squash and see how it goes.